Question

in VB is there any situation whereby x = Nothing is not the same as x is Nothing?

Also, x <> Nothing vs x IsNot Nothing

I’m thinking that they are purely identical.. but just wanted to be sure.

Answer 1

There’s a difference with empty strings, which do count as Nothing with simply “=” or “<>” but don’t count as Nothing for Is / IsNot:

Public Class Test
    Public Shared Sub Main()
        Dim x As String = ""
        Console.WriteLine(x = Nothing)   ' True
        Console.WriteLine(x Is Nothing)  ' False
    End Sub
End Class